


an ever-fixed mark

by chicken_neck



Series: Marriage of True Minds [2]
Category: Gilmore Girls
Genre: F/F, M/M, Multi, Post-Gilmore Girls: A Year In The Life, can you believe there aren't any fics with brian/zack yet, if ye want to avoid that, talk of babies, they are ....in love
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-15
Updated: 2018-07-15
Packaged: 2019-06-10 23:44:38
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,241
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15302676
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/chicken_neck/pseuds/chicken_neck
Summary: Lane went on tour, Lane came home, Zack went on tour, Zack came home. Sometimes Brian went on tour, but he was heading Stars Hollow’s only tech security consultation firm these days. It was stable.So, after going on a date with her second-oldest friend and having like, three kinds of crisis about it? Rory went to Lane’s.





	an ever-fixed mark

**Author's Note:**

> Zack & Brian ... love.  
> I'm giving lane everything she wants because I am a good person.

Rory always found comfort in the constant sameness of Lane’s life. While Rory’s own life after high school has been variable at best, Lane's life updates always had the same features - her bands, her boys, her husband, her hookups. As chaotic as her home seemed, the clutter was a surface level distraction from the bone-deep security and stability of the place. The bands changed, but the family was fixed. Lane went on tour, Lane came home, Zack went on tour, Zack came home. Sometimes Brian went on tour, but he was heading Stars Hollow’s only tech security consultation firm these days. It was stable.

So, after going on a date with her second-oldest friend and having like, three kinds of crisis about it? Rory went to Lane’s.

“You're lucky you caught me,” said Lane, bringing two beers to the living room. Zack and Brian were doing what looked like bookkeeping at the dining table, so Rory and Lane set up on the worn sofas of the music corner. “Goth Wife are shipping out on our northwest tour this Wednesday. It’s good of you to time your life crises around my busy schedule.”

“It’s really the least I can do,” said Rory, waving away the beer. “Which one's Goth Wife again?” 

“Oh you know, Angie’s the vocalist? The chick I met at roller derby? We opened for Tegan and Sara that time?”

“Ohhh, your lesbian girlband.”

“Eh, 60% lesbian, 20% bisexual, 20% from Portland.”

“Why Lane,” Rory teased, “all these years I thought you were a Star’s Hollow native.”

“Please, you worked for the Gazette, you know those birth announcements are impossible to fake.”

“Well genealogy is important in a town this small! Don’t cross the streams.”

“Five generations seems excessive to me.”

There was a lull 

“So, Lane, you know how,” Rory halted, unsure how to phrase this, “well you know how you hook up with girls when you’re on tour?”

“A healthy and fully consensual addition to my happy marriage for which I will not be made ashamed,” she paused to take a sip of her beer, “and which reflects my personal preferences and nothing about bisexuality more broadly, yes?”

“You tell em, babe,” said Zack, without looking up from his paperwork.

“Well,” said Rory, nervous now she remembered there were other people here. “I. Well. I’m in a situation that’s - well not similar. But.” the silence stretched on while she - she! Who had a journalism degree! Who was writing a book! - struggled to even begin to explain the situation, “girls?” she finished lamely.

“Girls.” said Lane, seriously. Rory found herself cracking under the weight of her steady gaze, and found herself saying - 

“Say Zack, how come you never hook up with people on tour?” 

Zack seized the distraction from paperwork with gusto. Mutually beneficial subject change. “What can I say, I'm an old-fashioned monogamist guy,” he said. 

“You're literally not,” said Brian. 

“I’m married my high school sweetheart and the first guy ever I hooked up with, man. That seems pretty monogamous to me”

“And those are two different people. Which makes it not monogamy.” 

Zack shrugged indifferently, “I think I'm pretty monogamous.”

“Am I going to have to bring out a dictionary? Look,” Brian struggled to get his phone out of the pocket of his skinny jeans without standing up, “I'm googling. You made me Google.”

Lane eyed her squabbling band mates, and then looked back to Rory, las if she’d done this on purpose. “Let's take your girl problems to the kitchen, Rory.”

“Sounds good.”

“- from Merrion Webster. Is that not a reputable source to you?” Said Brian.

“Well it's not how Zack defines it,” said Zack, winking at him.

“Well I really don't th-”

 

“Sorry about that,” said Rory, as Lane shut the door, on the argument.

Lane shrugged, “they're gonna want to have make up sex in about 20 minutes and it would be easier if they didn't have to make excuses to leave the room.” 

“Oh wow. That's not where I thought that was going.” 

“Household finances are frustrating. The petty-fight-and-make-up-sex system is an established and efficient pattern for a 40 minute break.”

“I'll say.” They could still hear the rise and fall of the argument in the next room.  Rory sat at the counter and examined the detritus of family life stuck to the fridge. A fridge magnet that was either in the shape of South Dakota, or just slightly melted on one side. A reminder to label clearly anything which had dairy in it, for the sake of the family’s communal plumbing as well as Brian’s personal wellbeing. A report card - Kwan was getting fantastic grades in English. 

“So. you have girl trouble,” said Lane, finally breaking the silence.

“Yeah.”

“And you’re reeeeally reluctant to talk about it.”

“Yeah...” 

“Well, is it general or specific? Actual or conceptual?”

“Specific. Actual. We had a date.” Rory examined her nails for a moment, wished she had a cup of coffee. “The other thing you should probably know is that I’m pregnant.”

Lane swayed slightly where she stood. “You’re pregnant?” 

“Yeah”

“And you have girl trouble?”

“Yeah,” Rory said dejectedly, aware that her responses were not really befitting of a writer.

“And the thing with Logan?”

Rory gestured to her abdomen meekly, “a last hurrah”.

“Well that’s a relief. You’re keeping it, I take it.” 

Rory’s stomach did a flip, “yeah.”

“Does your girl know that you’re pregnant?” 

“No.” 

Lane lowered herself into a chair, looking at Rory warily, “so when did Paris ask you out.”

“What?!”

“What ‘what’?”

“You can’t know that. How do you know that,” panic stunned Rory like a klaxon ringing in her ear- if Lane knew, if people in Stars Hollow knew, if people knew before she even knew, oh god, if  _ Dean  _ knew, if - 

Lane looked at her in disbelief. “You guys have made out like a dozen times. Paris totally has a thing for you.” She paused for a moment, “also we hooked up after a show in Brooklyn in 2013. So I knew she wasn’t straight.”

“2013? Lane, she was married!”

“She was frustrated. They were on a break.” Lane shrugged, “I was on tour.”

“I can’t believe this.”

“For the record, she was a great lay.” Lane said, sounding slightly wistful, “it was like she wanted to claw my organs out.” 

Rory wrinkled her nose, “that doesn’t sound that great.”

“Maybe claw isn’t the right word,” said Lane. “Iit was more kind of -” she made a pointed shape with the fingers of one hand, and looked at it speculatively. “She was like, grabby.” she shrugged. “You’d have to have been there, I guess.”

Rory’s frayed nerves were feeling ever more strained, “I’m glad I wasn’t.” 

“Except,” Lane raised her eyebrows, “in the way that you want to be?” 

“Can I have a moment to be weirded out that you slept with the - the person I’m dating. Or, have dated. Have been on a date with.”

Lane smiled gently, a little wryly, “you’re going to have to leave that freak out behind you in the hetero world. We do things differently over here.”

Rory buried her head in her hands. “I haven’t even told you the worst part yet.”

“What?” asked Lane, not a little apprehensively, “you’re pregnant, you’re dating  _ Paris _ , who doesn’t  _ know  _ you’re pregnant. What’s the worst part?”

Rory breathed deeply, staring out at her from between her fingers, “I still haven’t told my mom.”

**Author's Note:**

> Catch me on tumblr @spindletrees.
> 
> Comments muchly appreciated <3


End file.
